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The Trifecta Challenge this week is the word light, the 3rd definition. Please click here for the full definition. I chose definition (a) for this piece.

HEAVEN SENT

She never knows when the light will visit. It’s not predictable like her menstrual cycle, nor does it give a warning like the aura before a migraine headache. The light catches her at random, and when it does, she knows she must stand still and pay attention.

Today she’s out walking AJ the family dog through the neighborhood when the light appears. Even though it’s only 7 a.m., already the air has a weight to it, dampening the skin with the first step outside. She’s silently berating herself for wearing leggings when the first glimmer emerges.

The moment never follows a movie script: no clouds parting above, no beams of light encapsulating her, no virile voice summoning her. Instead, the light seems to emanate from behind her own eyelids and the voice she hears is her own. Not very dramatic, but it does the job.

Early on, she mistook the visions for migraine variants, the messages simply another part of her prodromal symptoms. But the communications proved germane, and now she knows when she ignores a dispatch, she regrets it.

Today the light blazes bright, like a spotlight shone in her face on a moonless, starless night. She can no longer see the street stretching in front of her. She stops walking. AJ barks, but he seems far away, echoey and muffled.

The light conveys an orange hue today. The tone and intensity vary from vision to vision, but the light itself bears a consistent character unique from any earthly light she has seen, and for this reason, she deems it divine. She can almost feel it on her skin, as if it has a texture, like the softest Egyptian cotton or a newborn baby’s cheek. She doesn’t actually feel it, of course, but the way the light presents itself seems three-dimensional, a feast for more than just one sense.

I’d like to read more light stuff, so I’m affecting change in myself by trying some lighter pieces. I think sometimes we live under the delusion that in order for something to be good, it must be dark and tragic. Really, I think it just needs to be entertaining. I hope this was!

Very nice! I could go so many different ways in what that light is – I’m definitely a mystic/hippie/New Age type, so my mind’s going crazy with the ideas! But I like how it’s written, all of the details – very nicely done!